


In A New Light

by brax



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Jealousy, M/M, Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-21
Updated: 2015-01-21
Packaged: 2018-03-06 16:09:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,527
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3140498
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brax/pseuds/brax
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If it's a choice between bonding and hockey, Zhenya is going to choose hockey every time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In A New Light

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Snickfic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snickfic/gifts).



> Many thanks to Nikki for fact-checking and cheerleading, and to T. for generously offering to beta read.
> 
> Ignores the Caps' December schedule and the Pens' mumps woes.

At the age of seventeen, Zhenya was one of only two omegas competing in the 2004 World Juniors tournament in Finland. He was the only omega on the Russian team.  
  
Back home in Magnitogorsk, there were people who disapproved of Zhenya playing on teams that included alphas. There were people who disapproved of him playing competitive sports at all. But this was his first international tournament. There were more reporters here than he had ever seen before, and their presence made him feel like he would be playing under a microscope. There were even Russian reporters, which meant there was no escaping the questions. On the first day, he felt like everything they asked him implied that he wasn’t mentally or physically strong enough to play at this level. They asked him personal questions about his heats. They asked him about his suppressant dosage and if he thought it was strong enough.  
  
It was humiliating, and he was relieved when they let him go.  
  
Coach gave him a sympathetic pat on the shoulder and handed him a room key. “You’re with Ovechkin.” He sounded even more sympathetic about that.  
  
Zhenya knew Ovechkin. He had played against him in junior tournaments at home. The guy had always been obnoxious. Too loud. Sometimes cocky. The thing was, though, he’d never been cruel. Zhenya had faced dozens of alphas who thought it was okay to tell him that he was presenting himself so nicely when he bent over to take a faceoff or when he found himself pinned on his back in a fight. Who liked telling him that omegas were for breeding, not for playing hockey. Ovechkin had never been one of those alphas.  
  
Zhenya’s parents told him to surround himself with safe people in Finland and he thought Ovechkin was probably safe. He accepted the key with relief.  
  
“Why do you look like someone just ran over your puppy?” Ovechkin asked when Zhenya walked into their room. He had taken the bed closest to the door, which was fine with Zhenya. He wanted the one next to the window anyway.  
  
“Reporters,” Zhenya grunted. “They’re all talking about how I shouldn’t be competing. Could go into heat and throw you and Radulov off.”  
  
“Aren’t you on suppressants?”  
  
“Yeah.” The coaches would have never let him play without putting him on the highest suppressant dosage he could safely take.  
  
“So what’s the problem? You know it’s bullshit.”  
  
Zhenya shrugged. He didn’t know how to talk about the question that was bothering him most. “One of them asked me what my future plans are.”  
  
“NHL,” Ovechkin said immediately, like it was just that simple.  
  
For him, it was, Zhenya thought bitterly.  
  
“They asked how I’m ever going to bond if I go pro,” he said, his shoulders hunching involuntarily.  
  
Zhenya was tall. He was the same height as Ovechkin. But he was still skinny, still hopelessly narrow in the shoulders — _like a beanpole_ , his mother liked to say. He still _looked_ like an omega. If he was going to go pro, he was going to have to get a lot bigger. No alpha wanted an omega who had to bulk up for hockey. And in Russia, omegas were expected to stay at home and bear children as soon as possible. No alpha wanted an omega who had to travel all the time. He would earn more money than most alphas too. That was yet another mark against him as a desirable bondmate.  
  
“So don’t bond,” Ovechkin said. “Fuck who you like. That’s better anyway.”  
  
“Is it?”  
  
Zhenya’s parents were both betas. They were bonded, but it wasn’t the same for betas. His friend Katya from school said that alpha-omega bonds were more intense, that omegas needed an alpha to support them and look after them.  
  
“Works for Jagr,” Ovechkin said.  
  
Zhenya laughed. He had seen the pictures of Jagr’s beautiful alpha and beta girlfriends. It was true that he always looked happy despite being an unbonded omega well into his thirties.  
  
“I don’t know,” Zhenya joked. “I always suspected he had something going on with Lemieux. That’s why they traded him. A cover up, you know.”  
  
Ovechkin laughed so hard he nearly rolled right off the bed. “Why did you say that? Imagine if one of us gets drafted by Pittsburgh in June. How will we look Lemieux in the face?”  
  
Zhenya grinned, thinking about getting drafted by the Penguins, or any NHL team at all.  
  
“So tell me what it’s like,” Ovechkin said. “To be in heat.”  
  
Zhenya choked.  
  
“What? We’re friends now. You can tell your friend Sasha these things.” He waggled his eyebrows.  
  
Zhenya hesitated. He didn’t know Sasha very well, but he thought that he wouldn’t mind calling him a friend.  
  
“It’s lonely.”  
  
“Lonely?” Sasha’s eyes went round. “You mean you’ve never gone through heat with an alpha? Or even a beta?”  
  
Zhenya felt himself flush. “Alphas like to get bonded to virgin omegas,” he said. It was the mantra that was drilled into you in school. Good omegas waited until they were bonded.  
  
Sasha wrinkled his nose. “The whole virgin omega expectation is so much bullshit. Alphas can fuck a hundred people before bonding and no one says anything.” He sounded outraged on Zhenya’s behalf. “Anyway, didn’t we just decide you’re going to play hockey in the NHL instead of getting bonded? You should just go for it.”  
  
Zhenya thought about getting held down and knotted for real, instead of having to use toys that never felt right. That never felt like enough. He buried his face into his pillow because just imagining it was making his skin feel too small.  
  
“Do you have a lot of experience with omegas in heat?” he asked without looking at Sasha.  
  
He could almost hear Sasha’s smirk. “Yes.”  
  
Zhenya ignored the rush of heat that rocketed through him. “Maybe you’re right. But it has to wait until after the tournament.”  
  
“After the tournament,” Sasha agreed. “Then we get you laid.” He said it like he had decided it was his own personal mission to make it happen.  
  
Zhenya shook his head fondly and settled in to take a nap.

***

They were eliminated embarrassingly early.  
  
Afterwards, Zhenya didn’t want to go out for drinks with the team, and neither did Sasha. They went back to their room and without talking about it crawled onto the same bed. Sasha curled around Zhenya, an arm wrapped too tightly around Zhenya’s waist. It wasn’t comfortable but being held was making Zhenya feel less like he might shake apart from the disappointment, so he didn’t object.  
  
Sasha’s mouth brushed against the nape of his neck. Zhenya tried not to react.  
  
Then it happened again, and it felt purposeful this time.  
  
“What are you doing?” Zhenya whispered in the dark.  
  
Sasha’s mouth curved against his skin. The smile was small, but it was there. “I did promise to finally get you laid,” he said. His hand moved from Zhenya’s waist to his hip, squeezing gently. Zhenya jumped slightly, and that was when he realized that Sasha was hard, pressing insistently against Zhenya's ass. Zhenya didn’t think he could even get hard with how terrible he felt about the tournament, but he couldn’t deny that he was stiffening inside his sweatpants.  
  
“I’m not going to go into heat,” he warned. “Suppressants, remember?”  
  
“When will you get it?”  
  
The team doctors had timed it for next week. He told Sasha.  
  
“Come home with me.”  
  
“What?”  
  
“When we get back to Russia,” Sasha said. “Come and stay with me in Moscow. My parents won’t be there. They’re going to Italy. I’ll get you through your heat.”  
  
Zhenya’s heart was beating hummingbird-fast inside his ribcage. “Really?”  
  
“Of course.” Sasha’s hand slipped inside Zhenya’s sweatpants and curled loosely around his cock.  
  
Zhenya arched into the touch helplessly. “What are you doing? You said next week.”  
  
Sasha slid his other arm around Zhenya’s waist to hitch his body impossibly closer. “Zhenya,” Sasha laughed. “You don’t really think people only have sex when the omega goes into heat, do you?”  
  
Thankfully, Zhenya didn’t have to come up with a lie, because Sasha’s hand started working him in long, determined strokes. He cried out, turning his head to the side. Sasha took that opportunity to catch Zhenya’s mouth in a kiss that was all tongue, and Zhenya felt himself start to slick.  
  
Oh, he thought. _Oh_.

*** 

It was lucky that Sasha’s parents were gone because Zhenya’s heat made the whole house smell like sex for three days. Three days during which Zhenya learned how much better heats were when someone else was there with you, giving you what you need.  
  
Sasha pressed a chaste kiss to Zhenya’s cheek when his heat broke, and it felt almost incongruous after everything they had just done together.  
  
“Screw getting bonded,” Sasha said, sighing happily into his sweat-, slick- and come-soaked sheets. “Just fucking is so much better.”  
  
Zhenya watched Sasha. He was on his back with his eyes closed. He looked wrecked and satisfied and he smelled like Zhenya all over.  
  
Zhenya felt something inside his chest clench tight.  
  
He forced a smile. “Yeah,” he said. “It is better.”

*** 

Zhenya went home to Magnitogorsk after that, forgot about bonding and fucked who he liked.  
  
He avoided the alphas who seemed like they wanted to sleep with him because they got a power rush from knotting someone bigger than them. He said no to betas who wanted him because they were curious about what it was like to fuck an omega in heat. He didn’t even speak to anyone who expected him to be easy just because he was an omega.  
  
And he ignored everyone who said his two years in the Superleague were enough and he needed to settle down now.  
  
He went to Pittsburgh.

*** 

In Pittsburgh, he met Sid.  
  
Sid was an alpha, but from the very first day, there was no hint of the negative stereotypes Zhenya had observed in alphas with much, much less talent. He was a leader but not controlling, confident but not arrogant. The best part was that he never treated Zhenya like he was different though he was the only omega on the Penguins and one of only twenty in the NHL.  
  
It didn’t take long for Zhenya to realize that while North America might be more liberal than Russia when it came to attitudes about omegas, there was still a long way to go in terms of actual representation. But Sid stayed after practice to help Zhenya work on his faceoffs and he wasn’t afraid to go as hard as he would on any other teammate. He helped when Zhenya forgot the English word for something. He even changed his routine so Zhenya could walk out last.  
  
He included _everyone_. Jordy, their rookie Staal, who was also an alpha. Letang, who came in and out of the lineup whenever he was called up from WBS. Robs and Georgie, who joined them halfway through the season. Everyone.  
  
He was going to make a great captain one day, Zhenya thought.  
  
Zhenya’s third month in Pittsburgh, a reporter asked Sid if having Zhenya on the team made him uncomfortable or made it harder for him to concentrate on hockey when Zhenya’s heats drew closer. Sid said no without hesitation and it was the first time Zhenya truly felt like leaving Magnitogorsk was the smartest decision he had ever made.

*** 

There was always media speculation about the nature of Sid and Zhenya’s relationship. It was expected, because they were playing well, taking the Penguins to the Stanley Cup finals in just their second year together, and because they were both unattached — unlike Brooksie and Jordy.  
  
It wasn’t a big deal until the day Sid got into a fight for Zhenya.  
  
Ballard hipchecked Zhenya hard along the boards, but it was clean and Zhenya wasn’t even hurt. He didn’t expect Sid to fly completely off the handle, throwing off his gloves and doing a surprisingly decent job of holding his own against Ballard.  
  
Jen wanted to speak to them both after the game.  
  
“Do you want to tell me what that was?” she asked Sid.  
  
Sid sank lower in his chair. “It looked like a bad hit.”  
  
“It was a clean hit.”  
  
“It looked borderline in the moment,” Sid insisted.  
  
“There isn’t anything you two need to tell me, is there?” Jen asked, staring hard at Zhenya.  
  
Zhenya shook his head, annoyed that the question was even being asked. People defended their teammates all the time without needing emergency meetings with PR, but because it was him and Sid, there was an immediate assumption that it was about dynamics.  
  
Jen turned to Sid.  
  
“No,” Sid said stiffly. He fidgeted with his water bottle and Zhenya realized that, across his right hand, his knuckles were angry-red and swollen.  
  
Jen sighed. “Tomorrow’s going to be a very long day.”  
  
They left her office in silence, but Sid stopped Zhenya outside the locker room, likely because it was quieter out here and free of nosy, eavesdropping teammates.  
  
“I’m sorry,” he said sincerely. “It really did look borderline in the moment. You _could_ have been really hurt, and I just…reacted without thinking.”  
  
“It’s okay, Sid.” Zhenya lost his temper and took bad penalties all the time. It wasn’t fair that Sid should have to apologize for doing the same just because an alpha fighting for an omega looked bad, like Sid was trying to stake a claim.  
  
“It wasn’t because I think you can’t handle yourself,” Sid added.  
  
“I know,” Zhenya assured him.  
  
Sid exhaled. “Good.”    
  
Zhenya reached out to brush his fingertips over the knuckles of Sid's right hand. The skin felt broken and hot to the touch. Zhenya’s stomach tightened with — something. Gratitude? “Use ice when you get home.”    
  
Sid stilled, staring at his hand like he hadn't noticed the damage until now. "I will," he said after a long moment, and led them back into the locker room.  
  
So they were fine.  
  
But as predicted, the media blew it completely out of proportion. The old argument that omegas distract alphas on the ice and should, if they were so desperate to play, perhaps be given their own league, came back with a vengeance. There were even some people who thought Zhenya distracted Sid specifically, accompanied by actual stats work purportedly showing that every month, Sid’s numbers fell slightly the closer Zhenya got to his heat.  
  
The team thought it was hilarious more than anything else. Jordy showed Zhenya an article suggesting that Sid and Zhenya had been secret bondmates since Zhenya first came to Pittsburgh. Max and Flower laughed themselves sick over a blogger who thought the fight proved that Sid was courting Zhenya. They gleefully showed everyone before practice until Sid scowled and snapped at them to put their phones away.  
  
“Don’t be like that, Sid,” Flower said, winking at Zhenya. “We think it’s sweet you’ve decided to court G after, what was it?” He squinted at his phone. “Oh yeah, three years of pining.”  
  
Sid flipped Flower off even as his cheeks threatened to go pink.  
  
Sergei was the only Penguin who didn’t find it funny. “Are you sure it meant nothing?” he asked Zhenya when they got home.  
  
“Yes. Sid thought it was a dirty hit. That’s all.”  
  
“And you? It meant nothing to you?”  
  
Zhenya could tell Sergei was worried that Zhenya was going to develop feelings for Sid and make things uncomfortable for everyone. There was no need. Sid was great — the best — and Zhenya was lucky to be on a team with him, but they were just friends.  
  
“It meant nothing,” Zhenya assured him.

*** 

The fight was forgotten entirely when the Penguins won the Cup two months later.  
  
For the first time, Zhenya went back to Russia and wasn’t asked questions about when he would be returning home permanently to get bonded and have kids. He was asked questions about his Conn Smythe and Stanley Cup ring.  
  
He felt like he was floating all summer, deliriously happy.  
  
The only low point was when he ran into Sasha in Moscow. They were having dinner at the same restaurant and Sasha came over and introduced himself to all of Zhenya’s friends. When he told Zhenya congratulations, there was an ugly twist to his mouth.  
  
It had been years since he and Sasha were really close. It wasn’t like Zhenya had been avoiding him, but when they last hooked up in Turin three years ago, Sasha conveniently forgot to mention he was dating someone in DC. Zhenya stopped replying to his messages after that.  
  
“Thank you,” Zhenya said in the politest voice he could manage. “I’m sorry it didn’t work out for you.”  
  
“No, you’re not.”  
  
The last time they saw each other was in the second round of the playoffs. Zhenya wasn’t sorry about winning, but he was sorry about the things that Russian papers were saying about Sasha now.  
  
“We deserved it more than you,” Sasha said quietly.  
  
“Sid outplayed you,” Zhenya disagreed.  
  
“Did he?” Sasha’s mouth twisted again.  
  
“Yes.” Zhenya played better against the Hurricanes and the Red Wings, but Sid _owned_ the Capitals series.  
  
Sasha stared at him for a long, long moment. Then his expression shifted, like there was something dawning on him. “You and Crosby, huh? So it’s true you’re fucking. That’s real smart, Zhenya.”  
  
“We’re just friends,” Zhenya snapped.  
  
“Yeah, you keep telling yourself that,” Sasha said, stalking away.

*** 

It wasn’t just Sasha.  
  
Friends. Family. Reporters. Random alphas Zhenya picked up in bars who stuck around to talk about hockey with him even after his heat broke and he would rather they just leave. They all asked about his relationship with Sid. It seemed like everyone thought he was in love with his captain even though there was no truth in it.  
  
And then he and Sid both got injured at the same time and suddenly —  
  
Well. Suddenly there was some truth in it.

*** 

“I just realized something.”  
  
“What?”  
  
“It’s the end of the month. You should have had your heat by now.”  
  
Sid was stretched out on Zhenya’s couch, frowning. He had been staying in Zhenya’s spare room since the knee surgery. Mario’s kids were loud and the quiet was better for his concussion, he said. Zhenya knew it was really because he wanted to help out while Zhenya was still on crutches. It was typical, thoughtful Sid and it had been nice to have company while his knee ached. But it also meant that Sid noticed embarrassing things like how Zhenya hadn’t had his heat this month.  
  
“Doctors make me take suppressant for whole month.”  
  
“That’s unhealthy.” Sid's frown deepened.  
  
It _was_ unhealthy. Even regulating heats the way Zhenya did for hockey was ill-advised, but skipping months completely could cause real complications down the line.  
  
“It’s just this one month,” Zhenya said. “Hard to be in heat with hurt knee.”  
  
Sid leaned forward and the movement stretched his thin shirt across his shoulders, emphasizing how broad they were. “Because you can’t go out?”  
  
Sid had seen Zhenya bring people home when it was time for his heat. Sometimes he even offered opinions when the team took Zhenya out to bars and made a game of suggesting alphas and betas for him. It was fun for them. They didn’t judge. North Americans were less disapproving about unbonded omegas having sex than Russians were. Zhenya had always been grateful for that.  
  
But this wasn’t about going out. The real reason he couldn’t go into heat this month was because the team doctors didn’t want him to make his injury worse when he lost control of his faculties in that state. The truth was embarrassing, though, so he said yes to Sid’s guess.  
  
“You could hire a service alpha,” Sid suggested.  
  
“No,” Zhenya said immediately. It was something he had never done before and he never would.  
  
“Fine,” Sid said. “But I don’t think you’ll recover enough to go out next month either. You’ll need someone to come to you.”  
  
“Have people I can call,” Zhenya said. There were some people in Pittsburgh he had seen more than once. People he trusted. “Be fine.”  
  
“Oh,” Sid said. He fiddled with the battery compartment on the television remote, pushing the lid in and out. “That’s good.” There was a long pause. “Can I ask you something, G?”  
  
“Always,” Zhenya said.  
  
Sid licked his lips, and Zhenya caught himself staring at Sid’s shiny-wet mouth before he shook himself, redirecting his concentration to the words coming out of that mouth.  
  
“Why don’t you date?”  
  
Zhenya sucked in a surprised breath. Sid knew about his hookups, sure, but he had never asked about them before. “Not looking to bond,” he said.  
  
A faint line appeared between Sid's eyebrows. “Ever?”  
  
Sid sounded like he didn’t understand. Maybe he couldn’t. He was an alpha. He could concentrate on hockey for as long as he wanted. He could bond and have kids when he was forty and no one would tell him he was selfish for waiting.  
  
“Ever,” Zhenya said firmly.    
  
"Gonch says that in Russia, omegas are expected to bond really young."    
  
Zhenya nodded. "Why I'm not in Russia. Can't play hockey if I'm there."  
  
  "Bonded omegas can still play hockey," Sid said immediately.    
  
"Not in Russia." And honestly, Zhenya thought, it wasn’t much better in North America. Briere was the only omega he could think of who kept playing after bonding, and everyone knew how poorly that worked out for him and his family.  
  
Sid’s mouth went thin. “So that’s why you only spend heats with strangers?”  
  
“Just easier with people you don't know,” Zhenya shrugged. “Would never with friend or other hockey player. Cause too much problems.” He had learned from the mess with Sasha.  
  
Sid blinked, and then looked down at his hands. There was another pregnant pause. With Sid's head bowed like that, Zhenya couldn’t read his expression.  
  
“I guess that makes sense," Sid said at last. He stood abruptly. “Do you feel like something in particular for dinner?”  
  
Zhenya thought about it. “Chicken.”  
  
There was a small, barely-there smile on Sid’s face.  
  
“You have anything more specific in mind?”  
  
“Nope.”  
  
Sid shook his head, smile growing slightly, and headed to the kitchen.  
  
“Glad you here, Sid,” Zhenya said after dinner, when they were back in the living room, watching the Discovery Channel. It was getting late and Zhenya was slumped against Sid because he was too lazy to get a blanket and Sid was always so warm. He was just so grateful that Sid was here. He thought he might have gone stir crazy if Sid hadn’t shown up, and not just because Sid made much better food than he could manage on his own. He thought he could get used to having Sid around all the time, filling up space in his big house. “Really glad.”  
  
“Yeah, me too," Sid said quietly, and shifted so that Zhenya could comfortably rest his head on his shoulder.

*** 

At his next doctor’s appointment, Dr. Harner told him that his heats were getting more intense.  
  
“What?”  
  
“It’s taking longer for your heats to break. It used to take two days. Since you’ve been on IR, you’re reporting it takes three or four days.”  
  
Zhenya’s heart sank. The last time this happened, he had just been knotted for the first time and fallen too hard and too fast for Sasha.  
  
“Don't know why,” he lied.  
  
Dr. Harner sighed. “I don’t want to make you uncomfortable, Geno, but you need to tell us if you’re thinking about bonding.”  
  
“I’m not,” Zhenya said, and thought frantically about Sid, sitting in the waiting room just outside because he insisted on accompanying Zhenya to this appointment, even after Zhenya told him a million times that it wasn’t necessary.  
  
He didn’t know how he let this happen again. But he told himself that he could fix this. He had done it once before. He was spending too much time with Sid. That was the problem. He would put some space between them, let his feelings dissipate, and everything would go back to normal.  
  
“If you’re sure,” Dr. Harner said dubiously.

*** 

It was easier to keep his distance when they had to separate for the summer. Zhenya returned to Pittsburgh in perfect health and avoided spending time with Sid alone. He made sure the team was always around when they hung out.  
  
He tried hard to be subtle about it because he never wanted to hurt Sid. It wasn’t Sid’s fault that Zhenya was an idiot who didn’t learn from his mistakes. Sometimes he thought he saw Sid’s face fall when he asked Zhenya to do something and Zhenya declined with an excuse. But Zhenya couldn’t think about that. He was determined to get over his feelings before they ruined his hockey.  
  
He had to. Hockey was all he had.

*** 

He spent time with Sasha the summer after Team Russia's miserable showing in Sochi. They were in Moscow again, in one of the ultra-exclusive clubs Sasha loved. They sang, because they were drunk, and because Sasha mistakenly believed he had a nice voice. It was fun and easy, like things used to be between them.  
  
“Masha broke up with me,” Sasha said into Zhenya’s neck when he was too wasted to hold his own head up.  
  
“I know.” It was making all the papers.  
  
“I really loved her, you know.”  
  
“I know,” Zhenya said again. He didn’t feel bitter about it anymore. Not since Sid.  
  
Sasha sighed. “You’re a good friend, Zhenya. I’m sorry I was a dick.”  
  
“Me too,” Zhenya said. “I just stopped talking to you. It wasn’t fair.”  
  
“Call it even?” Sasha’s mouth pressed more firmly into his neck.  
  
Zhenya choked back a laugh. “I’m not going into heat until next week.”  
  
Sasha’s mouth curved against his skin. “Zhenya. You don’t really think people only have sex when the omega goes into heat, do you?”

*** 

Zhenya woke up in Sasha’s bed and there weren’t any messy feelings this time. Sasha made him breakfast and they kissed once on the mouth before Zhenya took a cab back to his apartment.

*** 

He made the mistake of telling Sergei about it.  
  
“Why do you think it was different this time?”  
  
Zhenya rolled his eyes. There was no need for Sergei to make a point. Zhenya knew why it was different. “I’m not in love with him anymore.”  
  
“So why did you do it?”  
  
“You don’t have to be in love to have sex,” Zhenya said, annoyed.  
  
“You’re right,” Sergei said. “But if you are in love, then the person you’re in love with is probably the person to be having sex with, no?”  
  
Zhenya flinched.  
  
“Sidney,” Sergei said. “It’s always been Sidney.”  
  
Zhenya shook his head. “No.” There was a strange ache in his chest he didn’t want to poke at right now.  
  
“You’re only saying that because you think he doesn’t feel the same way.”  
  
“He doesn’t,” Zhenya said firmly, and closed that can of worms by yelling for Natalie to come play checkers with him.

*** 

When Zhenya returned to Pittsburgh this time, the team was unrecognizable. He didn’t have Nealer or Juice anymore and there was a new coaching staff with a new system he needed to adjust to without the benefit of a training camp.  
  
The first time they played the Capitals was in December. It was also the first time they were shut out all season. Zhenya was due to go into heat after the game, and losing certainly didn’t help the unsettled, agitated itch under this skin. Then he received Sasha’s text, mid-change in the locker room, and it was so presumptuous he had to grin.  
  
**meet back at your place?**

*** 

“Don’t get up, I can take a cab to the airport,” Sasha said, pressing a chaste kiss to the nape of Zhenya’s neck.  
  
Zhenya was still half dead to the world, but he stretched and listened to Sasha’s off-key humming in the shower. He smiled, feeling good even if he was kind of sore and aching everywhere. He was glad that he and Sasha could do this now without complicating everything.  
  
Sasha made breakfast last time. Zhenya thought it was probably his turn to return the favor. He wasn’t a good cook like Sid, but he could manage omelettes and toast, no problem.  
  
It was possible he jinxed himself by thinking of Sid because in the middle of breakfast, he heard the front door open and there was no way it could be anyone else. Sid was the only person in Pittsburgh who had his key.  
  
Sid walked into the kitchen and stopped dead. He looked from Zhenya to Sasha with wide eyes.  
  
“Morning, Crosby,” Sasha said, munching on his toast with no care in the world for the stunned look on Sid’s face. He even looked a little bit like he was enjoying it.  
  
Zhenya yanked Sasha’s plate away before he could start talking. Zhenya hadn’t showered yet and probably reeked of sex. Sasha had hickeys on his neck. There was no denying what they’d been doing, but if there was one person in the whole world who could possibly make this situation more awkward, it was Sasha.  
  
“Hey!” Sasha protested in Russian. He reached for his plate. “I was still eating.”  
  
“No, you weren’t,” Zhenya informed him. “You were leaving.”  
  
“Fine.” Sasha sighed and drained his orange juice. “Find a way to explain this to your precious Crosby, then. I have to get back to my rookie, anyway. Make sure he hasn't trashed my house." Sasha's voice softened. Zhenya was about eighty percent sure he was sleeping with Kuznetsov. "I’ll see you at the All Star Game.”  
  
Sid waited until the front door slammed shut before he spoke. “Seriously?” He sounded quietly angry, his hands clenched into fists.  
  
“What’s wrong?” Zhenya said, caught off guard. He had expected Sid’s questions or Sid’s teasing. He hadn’t expected Sid’s anger.  
  
“Why him?” Sid snapped.  
  
“Why not him?” Zhenya said slowly.  
  
Sid swallowed, too loud in the silence of Zhenya’s kitchen. “Because you said you didn’t. With hockey players.”  
  
Zhenya remembered that conversation from three years ago. The only time Sid had ever asked Zhenya about his heats and what he chose to do with them. He had nearly forgotten about it. Sid apparently hadn’t.  
  
“Sasha is…reason I don’t. With hockey players.”  
  
“What do you mean?”  
  
Sid still looked angry but he sat down when Zhenya did. He avoided the chair Sasha had occupied.  
  
Zhenya rested his elbows on the table and tried to explain the mess that was him and Sasha in Finland and North Dakota and Turin.  
  
Sid’s shoulders wound tighter the more Zhenya talked. “You wanted him to be your alpha?” he asked when Zhenya was finished.  
  
“Maybe,” Zhenya said. He had been too young to know what he really wanted, he thought.  
  
“Why?”  
  
Zhenya thought about Sasha’s unexpected kindness when Zhenya needed it most, the casual way he shrugged off people who didn’t like him, how protective he was of people he cared about. “Lots of reasons.”  
  
“He wouldn’t make a good bondmate for you,” Sid said abruptly.  
  
Zhenya wanted to say that he didn’t want Sasha anymore. Hadn't for years. But Sid didn’t give him the chance.  
  
“How would that even work? You live in Pittsburgh, he lives in DC.” Sid’s leg was bouncing so hard it rattled the table. “And did you ever think about how irresponsible this is? How badly it would reflect on the team if anyone found out you’re spending your heats with him?”  
  
Zhenya reared back, stung. Sid was the last person he ever expected to make him feel shitty about who he chose to sleep with. The last person he ever thought would question Zhenya’s commitment to hockey. To _Penguins_ hockey.  
  
“I’m tired,” he heard himself say. His voice sounded far away, like it was coming from underwater. “See you in practice tomorrow.”  
  
He went upstairs without even waiting for Sid to leave first.

*** 

“What happened to you?” Tanger said when Zhenya walked into practice. “You look like you haven’t slept for a week.”  
  
Zhenya shrugged. He felt like he was in a fog and he skated like it too, lackluster at best. Sid was there but he wasn’t talking to anyone and he hadn’t looked at Zhenya once. Zhenya couldn’t decide if that was better or worse.  
  
Worse, he thought, when Sid was the first one out the door after practice. Definitely worse.  
  
Flower cornered Zhenya before he could go home too. “What's up with you guys?” he wanted to know.  
  
“Sid’s mad.”  
  
“I know that.” Flower sighed like his life was so hard. “Do you know why? I asked him. He didn't say anything.”  
  
“Because I sleep with Sasha. Sid thinks it’s bad for team.”  
  
“Who’s Sasha?” Flower said. It took him a second but he got it. “ _Oh_ , Ovechkin! You slept with Ovechkin?”  
  
Zhenya snuck a peek at his face and he looked surprised, but not disgusted. “Did you say Sid is _mad_ at you about that? That’s not…That doesn’t sound like Sid.” Flower’s surprise morphed into concern and that was understandable. Sometimes teammates fought. It was normal. But Sid and Zhenya had never been like that with each other. “I’ll talk to him. You go home and get some rest. You look like a zombie.” He gave Zhenya’s shoulder a reassuring squeeze and started disentangling himself from his pads.

*** 

Zhenya did sleep when he got home. He slept through the night and woke up feeling more human to the sound of his doorbell ringing incessantly. It was Flower.   
  
“I just talked to Sid,” he said when Zhenya let him inside.  
  
“What did he say?”  
  
“Not a lot,” Flower said apologetically. He took a long drink from the bottle of water Zhenya offered him before setting it down with a dull thunk. “So. Ovechkin.”  
  
“You mad at me too?”  
  
“Hey, your personal life is your personal life.” Flower raised his hands defensively. “But Max would totally kick your ass if he knew, I’m just saying.”  
  
Zhenya relaxed slightly, even managed a smile thinking of Talbo.  
  
“Can I just ask one thing?” Flower said very seriously.  
  
Zhenya nodded.  
  
“You started sleeping with him _before_ he had the missing tooth and tramp stamps, right? Please say the answer is yes.”  
  
Zhenya laughed so hard he had to put his face in his hands. “Shut up, Flower.”  
  
“I’m being serious,” Flower insisted, though he was terrible at keeping a straight face. “I need to know. And can you ask him how many times a month he dyes his hair?" He kept making jokes about Sasha until Zhenya, who was supposed to meet Max and Katya for lunch in an hour, kicked him out. He squeezed Zhenya’s shoulder again as he was leaving. “Sid was wrong,” he said, honestly serious this time. “He’ll figure that out.”  
  
Zhenya nodded even if he wasn’t so sure.  
  
“Geno?” Zhenya nodded again to show he was listening. “You know his problem isn’t really how the team might be affected, don’t you?”  
  
Zhenya didn’t know what Flower was trying to say, but apparently he wasn’t willing to say any more than that. He just shook his head, muttered something to himself in French, and walked to his car.

*** 

Sid's car pulled into Zhenya's driveway as Zhenya was locking up.    
  
Sid looked wary as he got out and approached. "Are you going somewhere? I can come back another time."   
  
 Zhenya shook his head and texted Max and Katya an apology for not being able to make lunch after all. "Come in." He let them inside.  
  
  They sat on opposite sides of Zhenya’s kitchen table again, watching each other. Zhenya breathed and waited for Sid to break the silence. Gave him time to gather his words. Sometimes Sid needed that.    
  
He took in Sid's appearance. It…wasn’t good. If Flower had joked that Zhenya looked like a zombie yesterday, he must have been downright frightened when he talked to Sid today. Sid looked far too pale and there were bags under his eyes. He looked _ill_.  
  
  "I'm sorry," Sid said. "I shouldn't have said what I said. I had no right to tell you who to spend your heats with."    
  
It sounded rehearsed but not fake. Sid never apologized if he didn't mean it.  
  
Knowing that, it was easy for Zhenya to say, "It's okay."    
  
"No." Sid made eye contact. Held it. "It's not."    
  
"I say is, so is." Zhenya didn’t hold grudges against friends. Didn't see the point. Sid apologized, so they could move on and forget this ever happened.    
  
After a moment, Sid nodded.  
  
Zhenya wondered if he should offer him something to eat. Sid looked like he needed it.  
  
“I think you should date," Sid said out of nowhere.    
  
"What?"  
  
  “I think you should date," Sid repeated. "Everything you told me about you and Ovechkin...I think you deserve better than that." There was a hard, defiant look on his face that Zhenya recognized from hockey. "I mean, if you still have feelings for him, then fine. If you _want_ to fuck around with strange alphas all the time, then that's fine too." He didn't particularly look like he was fine with either of those things and Zhenya wanted to point that out. "But if you're only doing it because you really think you can’t bond unless you give up hockey or something, you're wrong."    
  
Zhenya slumped back in his chair, feeling like he had just taken a hard check into the boards.     
  
Sid nodded once to himself. "That's it. That's everything I wanted to say."    
  
He stood to leave, but Zhenya stopped him with a hand on his forearm. "How do you know?"     
  
"How do I know what?"    
  
"That I'm wrong."  
  
  Sid frowned for several long moments like he was thinking hard about how to respond. Finally he said simply, "I would never make you give up hockey."    
  
It wasn’t really an answer and it didn't have to mean that _he_ wanted to bond with Zhenya, necessarily. But Sid's gaze was frank and a little broken open, and Zhenya was suddenly sure that it couldn’t mean anything else.    
  
Zhenya stood too, because he needed to feel like they were on even footing for this. "Sid," he said quietly.  
  
  "It's true, I wouldn't," Sid said and his voice was so earnest that Zhenya felt a bit lightheaded, could hardly believe that it was for him. Sid's eyes dropped to Zhenya's mouth. "Can I?" he asked.    
  
Zhenya nodded.    
  
Sid leaned up too fast, like he was afraid Zhenya was going to change his mind, but when he fit their mouths together, the kiss was warm and wet and unhurried. One of his hands came up to cradle Zhenya's jaw, and Zhenya melted into it helplessly. When Sid pulled back, they were both breathing hard. The air in the room felt too thick.    
  
"Is that a yes to the dating?" Sid asked.  
  
  He sounded hopeful more than anything else, and it made Zhenya feel hopeful too. "Yes," he said, leaning in again. "Yes, okay."

**Author's Note:**

> For reference, [Sid fighting Ballard for Geno](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XqmV_hT9V4w) and [Geno and Ovi singing drunken karaoke together in the summer](http://instagram.com/p/sVjjhvBoqS/?modal=true).


End file.
